Waste of the Day: HHS Grants Used to Teach Kids About Sex Toys

Topline: A nonprofit that has received $31.8 million in federal grant money since 2004 used funds to teach children about sex toys and encouraged them to hide the information from their parents, according to a new report from City Journal.

Sex toys – for children

Key facts: The Center for Innovative Public Health Research is based in San Clemente, California and describes itself as a group that “promotes positive human development.” It received funding from the National Institutes of Health and Centers for Disease Control.

Its Girl2Girl program, launched in 2017, used federal funds to create a “sex ed program just for teen girls who are into girls,” City Journal reported. Participants from ages 14 to 16 could sign up for “daily text messages” about “lube and sex toys” and “the different types of sex and ways to increase pleasure.”

The program’s website tells kids to decide on their own whether they should sign up for the text messages, and not tell their parents unless they want to, according to City Journal.

The nonprofit also received a $1.3 million grant for a study called “#TranscendentHealth – Adapting an LGB+ inclusive teen pregnancy prevention program for transgender boys.” The Department of Government Efficiency canceled over $620,000 of the grant in March, the New York Post reported.

Another $412,013 award from the NIH paid for “Capitalizing on the power of the Internet to survey Ugandan LGBT nationally.” The study focused on HIV prevention but also used focus groups to develop “salient language to query sexual and gender identity.”

The most recent payment to the nonprofit was $533,771 on Feb. 13, 2025 continuing a grant first awarded in June 2024.

Children getting the wrong lessons

Search all federal, state and local government salaries and vendor spending with the AI search bot, Benjamin, at OpenTheBooks.com. 

Summary: If the government is going to hand out millions to nonprofit health programs, it should be used to teach kids about health topics like nutritious eating and exercise, not sex toys and lying to their parents.

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This article was originally published by RealClearInvestigations and made available via RealClearWire.